about the festival

Sensational Elora - Festival of the Senses is the brain child of an amazing woman Rhoda Lipton. We lost Rhoda in June of 2012. Our annual award-winning Festival now organizes events throughout the year. The festival will continue to feature the renowned music, art, drama, film, food, scenery and architecture of historic Elora, culminating in our core festival events running throughout Thanksgiving weekend, including our Empty Bowls and Empty Glasses projects Pumpkin Day, and the Sensational Soup-off, raising money and awareness for the fight against poverty and hunger throughout Centre Wellington.

We strive to work with a wide variety of community partners to create Fabulous events that showcase what the Centre Wellington area has to offer. All of our programming is designed to entice all of your senses. To accomplish that our events incorporate food and drink, provided by local restaurants, caterers, growers and retailers.

A sampling of a few of our Events:

Film on a Plate (FOAP): Multiple films scheduled throughout the year

Our films are paired with themed food and drink prepared by local chefs. FOAP is a unique way to truly experience a movie with more than just the usual popcorn and candy. As an example in 2010 we showed the film Bottleshock, a film based on the wine industry. So take a wine themed film, add a sommelier from East Dell Winery (with sampling of course), wonderful rich food and an amazing dessert and you get FILM ON A PLATE. How much food is there you may ask... we like to explain it as "not quite dinner, but more than a snack"

Sensational Sounds: Multiple musical events scheduled throughout the year

Sensational Elora has organized many styles of musical events since our first year. In 2014, we started a series of jazz shows at the Elora Centre for the Arts. As an example, in May we hosted the dynamic Carol McCartney with an all star 5 piece band. These licenced events have been sell outs. It is highly recommended that tickets are purchased early as they go quickly.

We invite you to let your senses come alive as you immerse yourself in all that is Elora. Plan on truly sampling Sensational Elora by staying at one of our many inns or B&Bs, shopping in our unique stores and experiencing the charm of Elora and its environs.